Table 1.

Systematic review of studies included

Study	Country	Language	Centers	Blinding	N of arms	N Allocated			Acyclovir dose	Days of treatment	A scheme	C scheme	N Analyzed			S	N f	N m	Age (mean)	Age group included
						T C A							T C A
Drago 2006(10)	Italy	English	SC	SB	2	87	45	42	H	7	SS: Acyclovir	Placebo (vitamin C)	87	45	42	B	38	49	27.4	AD
Ehsani 2010(21)	Iran	English	SC	SB	2	30	15	15	H	10	SS: Acyclovir	Antibiotic (erythromycin)	30	15	15	B	15	15	32.0	AD
Rassai 2011(20)	Iran	English	SC	OB	2	64	NR	NR	L	7	SS: Acyclovir	Observation	54	26	28	B	NR	NR	27.12	B (>10yo)
Amatya 2012(23)	Nepal	English	SC	OpB	2	42	24	18	H	7	CS: Acyclovir + cetirizine and topical corticoid	Symptomatic (cetirizine and topical corticoid)	42	24	18	B	16	26	23.0	B (>2yo)
Ganguli 2014(22)	India	English	SC	DB	2	60	30	30	H	7	SS: Acyclovir	Placebo (vitamin C)	60	30	30	B	27	33	24.2	B (NR age)
Das 2015(19)	India	English	SC	OB	2	24	12	12	L	7	CS: Acyclovir + cetirizine and calamine lotion	Symptomatic (cetirizine and calamine lotion)	24	12	12	B	10	14	33.2	AD
Singh 2016(24)	India	English	SC	TB	2	33	NR	NR	H	7	SS: Acyclovir	Placebo	27	13	14	B	8	19	21.35	B (>40kg of weight)

Abbreviations: SC: single-center; SB: single-blinded; OB: observer-blinded; OpB: open-blinded; DB: double-blinded; TB: triple-blinded; NR: no reported; N: number of patients; N allocated: number of patients allocated to each treatment; N analyzed: number of patients who completed trial and entered to analysis; T: total; C: control group; A: acyclovir group; H: high dose; L: low dose; SS: single-scheme; CS: combined-scheme; S: sex; B: both; Nf: number of females; Nm: Number of males; AD: adult (>18yo).